Kelly Dean shows me the rejection letter from her insurance company. "It's a battle. I guess I'm going to have to keep fighting."

Kelly gazes out the window and holds her poise, her eyes subtly glazing over. She's been through hardship worse than this before. An opiate and heroinaddict for over a decade, Kelly was arrested in 2015, five days before the CDC officially proclaimed Austin, Indiana an "epidemic" due to rampant spread of HIV through unsafe needle sharing amongst local addicts. Kelly detoxed on the concrete floor of the Scott County jail--a process that involves fevers, sweats, diarrhea, vomiting, and abdominal cramps, to name a few--and despite sharing needles while in the throes of her addiction--her HIV test came back negative. Instead, she tested positive for Hepatitis C.

Today, Kelly Licensed Practical Nurse and works at the Austin Health Department as an HIV tester, as well as a certified recovery coach in her local community. She organizes a weekly recovery meeting in Austin, commuting from her new home in Louisville to help others with their struggles. She is by all definitions, a shining of example of someone who has rebuilt their life after the damage done by addiction. So the inability to receive treatment hurts.

"I'm 28 months clean today. I got me a job. I got insurance. And still I have to fight this."

Hepatitis C is a blood-borne virus that attacks the liver gradually, with symptoms developing over a number of years, depending upon the health of the individual. According to the CDC, between 2.7-3.9 million Americans have Hepatitis C, with infections largely spread through unsafe needle sharing during drug use. Without treatment, the virus can lead to liver disease or cirrhosis, a condition where healthy liver tissue is replaced over time by scar tissue, leading to infection, liver failure and eventually death.

Oh, and Hepatitis C is also curable.

But herein lies the rub. Treatment for the virus ranges from $70,000 to $120,000, and--due in larger part to the price point of the medicine--most health insurance coverage will not pay for treatment until cirrhosis occurs. This effectively means that a large number of those who carry the infection must wait until they are at the precipice of death in order to get help.

According to the Scott County Health Department, 96%of those diagnosed with HIV in Scott County since 2015 also have co-occurring infections of Hepatitis C. Austin, a town of approximately 4,300, has had a needle exchange program since the HIV outbreak in 2015, and spread of both HIV and Hepatitis C has curbed substantially. But if you consider that the co-occurring infection rate in the rest of the state is 8.6%, Austin’s numbers are astounding. The federal-state run-Medicare system inIndiana offers comprehensive coverage for those infected with HIV, but with Hepatitis C, they are effectively sent home to wait it out until their symptoms worsen. For some, this could be years.

Kelly is a registered nurse, employed at the Austin Health Department, with insurance provided by her employer, the state of Indiana. "I was told I had to be in Stage 3 liver disease before most insurance companies would--I guess they fight it up until that point--and because I don't have any liver damage . . . Like I'm still really good. Like I don't have any kind of problems with my liver . . .” She pauses to collect herself.

"But what doesn't make sense to me is if we're talking about money . . . you would think if I would get to Stage 3, cirrhosis, I'm not going to be able to work, I'm not going to be able to support myself. The state's going to have to pay for that."

So why are these drugs so expensive? Because drug companies want them to be.

A 2015 bipartisan review by the Senate Finance Committee concluded that Gilead Sciences Inc., a California based pharmaceutical company that makes the most popular Hepatitis C treatment Harvoni, kept their prices high to maximize profits. The company's first drug, Sovaldi, was priced at $84,000 for a 12-week of treatment, and their newer drug, Harvoni, priced at $94,500 for a 12-week course of treatment as of 2015. Consumers and insurance companies were, of course, irked by the astronomical price tag of the drug. The Massachusetts Attorney General threatened a lawsuit, but it never came to fruition. Gilead's drugs have a 95% cure rate, and they just released a medication in June that treats all six strains of Hepatitis C: Epclusa.

Kelly initially did not request Epclusa when discussing treatment options with her physician, because she feared the newness of the drug would give her insurance provider pause. After appealing her case, her treatment was finally approved, and as of the publication of this story, she is four days into her treatment.

But the US is not the only country fighting off Hepatitis C, and Gilead has not-so-quietly taken control of the markets in India, where generic facilities thrive. Working with 11 India-based facilities, Gilead creates generics for over 101 developing countries, providing medicine for the roughly 103 million people living in these nations. Gilead provides manufacturing licensing and instruction to these companies, allowing them to set their own prices, and in return Gilead gets a portion of the international profits. The cost? Between $500 to $1500 for a full round of treatment.

With an estimated profit of over $10 billion in 2017 from EpClusa alone, Gilead has a firm hold on the market, despite rising competition. And it doesn’t look as though there reign of profit over patients looks to stop any time soon. Individuals like Kelly—hard-working contributors to society—will have to keep up the fight on their own. No one else will do it for them.

I don’t know the first time I realized I had a problem with anger. It was a confluence of events—fights, usually escalated by me—between my ex-partner and I. A criticism would be shared, usually something that reflected her efforts to create clearer communication and feel recognized, and like a regulatory function in my brain I saw it as an attack.

Pretty soon it’s going back and forth, voices rising in volume and throaty harshness, and then she’s a “BITCH” and I’m throwing my Iphone across the room, punching a doorframe, or walking out in a fury. My blood pumping with adrenaline, I am convinced with total certainty that I have been ambushed, that I am an innocent bystander, that I was defiantly and nobly defending my honor from my partner’s betrayal. If she loved me, then why would she criticize me so harshly?

In time, the tension would ease—often after the shedding of tears. My rational mind would kick in and I would apologize, genuinely, for my behavior. Oftentimes, I could not remember the words I had said in the moment. I would cry too, citing my fear of abandonment, of rejection, of feeling unlovable. I lashed out because I was scared. Violent language was my defense against the perimeter I had built to maintain stability. My words were retaliatory blanks, fired off to reduce me from boiling over. But when you are on the receiving end such hatred, absorbing the volley of epithets and curse words and insults designed to hurt, you cannot forget. It stays with you, brands into your thoughts. It was and is, abuse.

I think it was easier for me to defer confronting my toxic anger because I never raised a hand to directly hurt my partner. I believed that abuse, in its definitive form, was attacking someone physically. I may have clenched my fists and thrown objects, but never at her, so how could that be me? That wasn’t me.

Except, it absolutely was.

The truth is, it really doesn’t fucking matter if you ever hit someone. Words are violence. And when you are intimately connected with a partner, you know their weak spots, the chinks in their armor. You’re entrusted to protect those places, but in my moments of rage I would swiftly use them to my advantage. You hurt me so now I will hurt you tenfold. All the while, believing that, because I was demonstrating assertiveness, my partner would not think I was weak. She would see I could stand up for myself and be even more in love with me.

There are numerous root causes for what is often deemed “toxic anger”, and much of it is pervasive in masculine culture. Emotional vulnerability is not the paramount lesson of young boyhood, but it very well should be. We teach our young men to “man up” and carry themselves with stoicism and boldness. We advocate extremes that negate the multi-faceted emotional landscape of being a human. Our parents do it. Our coaches do it. And our young men repeat it, and condition it into one another.

As a child and teenager, I was never the strongest or most gifted athlete. I cried easily, and I remember the jeers, heckling and even physical taunts of my peers-- both male and female.—because of it. I was a fag, a pussy, or just a woman. And I was desperate to relieve myself of what I saw as an inherently faulted personality.

So over the years, I used anger to defeat my fear of being ostracized. It emboldened me. When I roared, the room quieted. The laughter stopped. But mostly it caused devastation, and mistrust amongst my partners over the years. You lash out at loved ones enough, and eventually they will pull away. I’m lucky in that my most recent partner loved me enough to tell me how much I was hurting her when I lashed out. She encouraged me to seek help, therapy and healing to dissolve my anger. She established her own boundaries, took space and time for herself. That takes tremendous courage. And love.

And I still have flare ups. Sometimes I take criticism of an action as criticism of me and before I know it I absolutely cannot be fucked with. It’s my own version of going on a bender. I reemerge bleary eyed, amazed at the damage I have caused in so little time. It’s mortifying at first, but I learn more each time. I write. I speak to my therapist. I cry. Yes, I fucking weep, and I dig deep into the depths of emotional sludge that we try and hide away within ourselves and upchuck it onto the floor. It’s messy and sometimes downright terrifying, but when you face it, it disappears. Little by little.

And I’ll take that. Small steps. Incremental pushes toward the light, toward good, toward healing. A little more open, everyday.

Yesterday, I watched footage of Dakota Access CEO Kelcy Warren proclaim that the pipeline will not be re-routed and that he is confident it will be finished. In a brazen moment of double-speak, he said the following about the safety of the pipeline, which is now 90% complete: "We're not going to have a leak. I can't promise that, of course, but that--no one would get on planes if they thought they were going to crash."

He continued by stating that the thousands of self-proclaimed "water protectors" are "not a peaceful protest". Having just returned from my second trip to Standing Rock as a volunteer with the Rosebud Tribe, I beg to differ.

What I have witnessed upon each journey is a gathering of both native and non-native residents from across the country gathering to build a sustainable community that clothes, feeds and shelters thousands, while simultaneously pursuing every legal route possible to stop a pipeline that will inevitably taint their drinking water. The fact that Native-Americans--some of the most under-represented and historically abused cultures in America--are leading this resistance, speaks volumes to the wisdom they are trying so desperately to share with us regarding prioritizing fiscal gain over environmental preservation.

I only just now went through the few photos I took during my first trip in September, and they only offer a glimpse of the community building at the various camps. At the time, the mainstream media was beginning to catch onto the rising number of people flocking from around the world to give support to the Sioux tribe of Standing Rock attempting to defeat the Dakota Access pipeline, also known as "The Black Snake".

Now, winter has descended upon the camps, and due to multiple infiltrations by saboteurs, photography has become much more stringent. The images shared here do not offer the full scope of the effort that goes into making the encampment function. Many things not pictured are simply too scared to be captured. Builders, doctors, healers, elders and lawyers are among the many that have offered their services to keep this growing population healthy and safe. My motivation for sharing these images is to discount Warren's entirely false proclamation that this gathering is anything but peaceful.

Perhaps this pipeline will be built. Our political leaders--particularly the new President Elect--seem reticent to interfere, despite the dramatic effects this pipeline may have on the environment in the short and long term should it burst, But I am confident the water protectors of Standing Rock will continue to resist with civil disobedience in the face of illegal construction, lawsuits, and prayer gatherings at the camp. This is far from over. It is only the beginning.

Hey all! I've got a brand new, limited-edition set of "Desert" postcards coming for the holidays. For those interested in prints, but wishing to get more for their dough! Check out the images below, and I'll post more info as they arrive. Orders will cost $25 for a set of 10, taking about 2-3 weeks for delivery after ordering and printing.

I haven't shot black + white film since high school, when I first purchased a film camera and began learning how to develop in a dark room. I veered away from shooting in this format when I picked up film again, namely because I was excited to explore the world of color film, and because, frankly, I felt that black + white left the viewer wanting more.

I brought a roll of Ilford 50 along for the ride--mostly to experiment with double exposures--and was able to capture some of the start of the trip from Chicago to Montana, Just scattered moments. Some more memories for the scrapbook.

Over a month ago, myself and Sera Lindsey joined 36 strangers onboard an Amtrak sleeper car in Washington, D.C. bound for San Francisco. We had two weeks to make the meandering trek, stopping in Chicago, St. Paul, Glacier National Park and Portland, OR along the way. There was no set mission statement for the adventure--Passion Passport founder Zach Glassman organized the event to be an open-ended creative journey. Sure, there were hashtags and tourism boards involved, but we had no contractual obligations to "work". This was two weeks to just absorb, with guest speakers between cities as we trundled down the tracks through lesser-known American annals.

In the end, there were adventures and realizations too numerous to describe. The trip, after all, seemed to be a silent visual meditation on movement in the modern age. Are we going too fast? Is our search for moments and the ultimate photo for a social media post pulling us out of reality? The short answer, from my observations, is simply "no". I witnessed 15 people take the same photo while other splashed in a lake below Mt. Hood. I cried over poetry about God, though I don't define myself by any denomination. I felt cramped and anxious, accepted and loved, motivated and inspired.

The film scans are still coming in (my black and white shots should be done within the week), and I find myself nostalgic for friends and experiences that only two weeks ago were a part of my everyday. How astounding to be thrown into a moving steel box together and emerge as compatriots--stewards of one another's grace and beauty. It is a lovely thing to behold.

Sera and I recently went back to my father's ranch in the Big Horn Basin of Wyoming for the second time this year, to decompress, visit family, and recuperate from a month of manic activity. It continues to astound us the amount of mental clarity that comes when we remove ourselves from city life. Traffic din and police choppers are replaced with the sounds of horse hooves on rain-cleansed soil, the migration calls of sandhill cranes and distant thunder cries across the mountain peaks.

The first day often feels like reverse culture shock, our bodies and thoughts unaccustomed to stillness and open space. But after the first night's meal, and a poetry reading of the requisite Billy Collins poem "The Revenant" at the dining room table, we ease ourselves into the pace of ranch life. By day, we help with whatever chores need to be done: weed pulling, laying irrigation pipe, mucking horse manure, tilling the soil for the Spring crop, and feeding the animals.

The eight equine residents of the ranch--all of them rescues who work summers as therapy horses for the Wyoming Boys School and local war veterans--grazed just outside our summer camper. Even after spending months with them as my bedroom window companions in the past, I still find them infinitely fascinating as creatures of healing power.

A few days into our trip, we were visited by Sera's father Steve. Having grown up on a farm himself, Steve took to the open space with the quiet contemplation of a man returning to a sacred space. Our walk to the mud swallow nests at the cliffs above the canals brought an added serenity--unbeknownst to me, Steve has had a lifelong fascination with the swallow. Their fervent swirling flight as we walked beside the cliffs brought him to a church-like calm.

Now, at home beside our computers and electronic devices and demands and commitments, we find ourselves assessing and reassessing how we live. Are we maintaining this Earth with the same commitment as my father and stepmother? Are we simply idealizing our trips to Wyoming since they are free of financial commitments to maintaining a ranch (while we visited, the irrigation canal needed emergency repair and one horse required medical care for anxiety-produced foot pain)? There's probably not a simple answer. But we take solace in knowing that there's a refuge out there hidden away from the melee of the modern world. A space for afternoon naps and home-cooked meals. A space to just be, and breathe.

Last week, Sera and I drove past the derelict Sunset Pacific Motel--a long since abandoned apartment complex known locally as "The Bates Motel" due to it actually being on the corner of Bates and Sunset--and found it to be covered in white paint. The installment turned out to be that of French artist Vincent LaMouroux, who got permission to limewash the neighborhood staple before developer Frost/Chaddock demolishes the building to make way for a 122-unit live/work/retail space. A last hurrah before gentrification kicks in called #ProjectionLA.

I snapped a role on a bleary mid-afternoon, using what was--unbeknownst to me--a rejected overexposed role from Sera's point-and-shoot. Our developer called me the night before I was set to pick up my processed scans, warning me that the shots were "reallllly white and overexposed" and were mostly "random double exposures". In the end, the roll wasn't "perfect", but the beauty of film is that mistakes can become happy accidents.

Recently, I've been possessed by this insatiable urgency to get out and explore. I get pent up when I remain static in a city for too long--a kind of reverse cabin fever. It can be an affliction at times, idealizing the far-off and unknown hot springs and hiking trails of the natural spaces outside Los Angeles. The outdoors becomes a destination, a mission, a place to arrive at, shoot and leave. So, then where's the room for enjoyment?

It was with this in mind that my partner, Sera, and I sought to visit Death Valley, back in February--a location completely unknown to us at the time. With only two days available to make the trek in and out of the park, and a strong desire to make it a shooting trip, we made it a point not to visit every destination in the park, as if finishing a checklist. We would arrive at our own pace, stopping to take in views, detours, or interact with whomever crossed our path. Time would be limited, but we would saturate ourselves in the now, and if the desire to shoot arose, we wouldn't question it.

Playing around with in-camera double exposures

What is usually a leisurely 4-5 hour trek into the park took us upwards of nine hours, mostly because we stopped so damn often. The iconic 395 highway is one of two entrances into the park, and takes one through the rim of the Eastern Sierras (an area iconic and largely under-explored in its own right), so there was plenty of sudden braking and skidding and reversing and looking out for oncoming big rigs as we hustled across the two-lane blacktop to capture abandoned filling stations, RVs, and the vastness of the landscape.

A turnoff toward the park brought us out of the rain clouds of the Sierras, and immediately into the cracked and parched badlands of the Death Valley rim. With little to no human contact within site, we took it as a welcome chance to shoot nudes.

Chasing daylight (and sporadic rain clouds), we gunned it into the center of the park in enough time to grab a campsite and head into the clouds for the sunset.

And once the sun set, we headed below sea level into Badwater Basin. The limitations of a 50 mm lens on a Nikon FM2 (my camera of choice) don't properly demonstrated the grandiosity of the universe when it is unencumbered by the light poisoning of the city. Standing within the salt flats, one could tangibly feel the sphere of the Earth.

Orion's Belt

Expose the sky on film for too long, and the exposure captures the movement of the Earth and stars

The next day we left at dawn to chase the light. Much of our drive was spent oogling at the otherworldliness of the landscape, forgetting to take pictures entirely. Far from the trivialities and stresses of the city--and in a landscape known primarily for its desolation--we found ourselves enamored with its geological beauty. Every rock, every stone and curve of the Earth felt that it had purpose, meaning. One day in, our bodies coated in dust, and we felt elevated and rooted all at once.

The ravine where C-3PO and R2-D2 were dropped on Tattooine in the original "Star Wars"

Artist's Palette's colors come from the oxidation of different metals within the rocks

Morning tourists at Badwater Basin

On our way out of the park, we ran into an undercover park employee named Steve, taking in the morning views at Artist's Palette. After some unsolicited Star Wars info related to the park (see photo above), which, being Sci-Fi fans, we loved, Steve proceeded to give us some hot tips on a literal hot spring outside the park.

Eager to rinse of the dust before returning to urban life, we meandered out of the park into Nevada, pit-stopping in Tecopa, CA--a blip on the map that's popular for its Chinese Date Farm and volcanic hot springs. Ignoring the signs for "Mud Mites" after a local gave us the safety go-ahead, we spent the remainder of our trip soaking in sulphur perfumed mud, befriending an overzealous and bearded plumber from LA who--for at least a few minutes--convinced me he was Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top.

Tecopa still remains a secret to most travelers, largely due to its somewhat inconvenient location, and the general population's preference for Vegas and larger destinations that surround it. We're happy to keep it a quiet escape.